Photonic activation of reactants for sub-micron feature formation using depleted beams

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9869938-B2
Application number	US-201414452200-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 5, 2014
Priority date	Aug 8, 2013
Publication date	Jan 16, 2018
Grant date	Jan 16, 2018

Abstract

A fine feature formation method and apparatus provide photon induced deposition, etch and thermal or photon based treatment in an area of less than the diameter or cross section of a STED depleted laser beam. At least two STED depleted beams are directed to a reaction location on a substrate where a beam overlap region having an area smaller than the excitation portion of the beams is formed. A reactant or reactants introduced to the reaction region is excited by the combined energy of the excitation portions of the two beams, but not excited outside of the overlap region of the two excitation portions of the beams. A reactant is caused to occur only in the overlap region. The overlap region may be less that 20 nm wide, and less than 1 nm in width, to enable the formation of substrate features, or the change in the substrate, in a small area.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method of supplying reactant activation energy to a sub-micron area, comprising:
providing a first photon energy beam having a central non-depleted region and a surrounding depleted region and a full width of about 40 nm;
providing a second photon energy beam having a central non-depleted_region and a surrounding depleted region and a full width of about 40 nm; and
positioning the central non-depleted region of the first photon energy beam and the central non-depleted region of the second photon energy beam to overlap in a first overlap region, wherein an area of the first overlap region is less than an area of either the central non-depleted region of the first photon energy beam or the central non-depleted region of the second photon energy beam.

2. The method of claim 1 , further including:
providing a workpiece having a first and second work location on a surface of the workpiece,
positioning the workpiece so that the first overlap region extends over the first work location;
causing an energy-related effect to the first work location of the workpiece, and then
moving the workpiece relative to the first and second photon energy beams so that the first and second photon energy beams overlap in a second overlap region, wherein the second overlap region extends over the second work location.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein, during the movement of the workpiece, the first and second photon energy beams do not overlap.

4. The method of claim 1 , further including pulsing at least one of the first and second photon energy beams.

5. The method of claim 2 , wherein the second work location partially overlays the first overlap region.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first photon energy beam and the second photon energy beam are parallel and overlap along at least a portion of a length of each photon energy beam.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first photon energy beam and the second photon energy beam intersect at the first overlap region.

8. An apparatus for the formation of sub-micron features on a workpiece, comprising:
a first stimulated emission depleted beam generator;
a second stimulated emission depleted beam generator;
a moveable substrate support; and
optics defining a beam path between the moveable substrate support and the first and second stimulated emission depleted beam generators, wherein the optics include a blanking shutter.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the blanking shutter is a moveable mirror.

10. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the blanking shutter is operable to cause a beam from the first or the second stimulated emission depleted beam generator to change between an overlapping condition and a non-overlapping condition at the moveable substrate support.

11. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein each stimulated emission depleted beam generator further comprises a beam splitter and a micromirror array.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 , wherein at least one beam splitter comprises a Fourier grating.

13. The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the Fourier grating is a two dimensional Fourier grating.

14. The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the Fourier grating splits a beam from the respective stimulated emission depleted beam generator into a plurality of beamlets.

15. The apparatus of claim 14 , wherein the optics further include a beam combiner positioned in the beam path between the micromirror arrays of the first and the second stimulated emission depleted beam generators, such that beamlets from the first stimulated emission depleted beam generator pass through the combiner, and beamlets from the second stimulated emission depleted beam generators are reflected at the combiner.

16. The apparatus of claim 15 , further including a controller capable of independently moving each mirror of at least one of the micromirror arrays.

17. A method of causing a reaction at a sub-micron region of a substrate, comprising;
providing a first beam having a first excitation portion of a first energy level surrounded by a first depleted region;
providing a second beam having a second excitation portion of a second energy level surrounded by a second depleted region;
providing a third beam having a third excitation portion of the first energy level surrounded by a third depleted region;
providing a fourth beam having a fourth excitation portion of the second energy level surrounded by a fourth depleted region;
selectively partially overlapping the first excitation portion and the second excitation portion at a surface of the substrate to form a first reaction region having an area smaller than the projected area of either the first or the second excitation portion on the substrate;
selectively partially overlapping the third excitation portion and the fourth excitation portion at the surface of the substrate to form a second reaction region;
providing at least one reactant species at the first reaction region; and
performing a reaction involving the reactant species in the first reaction region but not in substrate regions adjacent to the first reaction region.

18. The method of claim 17 , wherein the reactant species is a deposition or etching reactant.

19. The method of claim 17 , wherein the first reaction region at least partially overlays the second reaction region, forming an overlay reaction region.

20. The method of claim 19 , further including:
interrupting the passage of the first and third beams such that the first and third beams do not reach the substrate;
moving the substrate; and
causing only the first beam to again reach the substrate.

21. The method of claim 20 , wherein moving the substrate occurs before the first beam again reaches the substrate.

22. The method of claim 20 , further comprising, after moving the substrate, selectively partially overlapping the first excitation portion and at least one of the second excitation portion and the fourth excitation portion in the presence of the reactant to cause the reaction in the overlay reaction region.

Assignees

• Applied Materials Inc

Inventors

• Mack James Francis
• Moffatt Stephen

Classifications

• G03F7/70375 Primary

  Multiphoton lithography or multiphoton photopolymerization; Imaging systems comprising means for converting one type of radiation into another type of radiation · CPC title

• G03F7/70383

  Direct write, i.e. pattern is written directly without the use of a mask by one or multiple beams (maskless lithography using a programmable mask G03F7/70291) · CPC title

• G03F7/704 Primary

  Scanned exposure beam, e.g. raster-, rotary- and vector scanning (mask projection exposure involving relative movement of patterned beam and workpiece during imaging G03F7/70358) · CPC title